University of Alabama students under the direction of Assistant Professor Wendy Castenell have curated an exhibition for the Paul R. Jones Museum titled Color by Color, opening May 4 with a First Friday reception in the downtown museum from 5:00 pm to 7:00 pm. The exhibition runs through June 29.
In the exhibition text greeting visitors to the Jones Museum, the curators ask, “How many black artists can you name? How many did you study?” The aim of this new exhibit, curated by students in Dr. Castenell’s African American Art (ARH 388), is to showcase the talent of artists whose skin color was the reason they could not show their artwork. The project also gave the students a chance to learn more about these artists collected by the late Paul R. Jones.
In addition, Color by Color focuses on the subject matter of artists of different cultures. According to the curators, “Color becomes a reflection of love, life and the generation of a people who’ve overcome a life of discrimination and prejudice to embrace their cultures through their art. With this theme, we see different interpretations of daily life, culture, emotions and a history of African Americans not seen before.”
The students conclude, “While we are not able to change past prejudices that prevented black artists from exhibiting their work, we can now move forward to deliberately showcase their incredible skills and understand their experiences. We hope that by visiting this exhibition you will have learned a bit more about these underappreciated artists and fully experience Color by Color.”
Josh Allen, Robby Bradford, Hannah Christopher, Elizabeth Essary, Megan Foster, Katie Freeman, Melissa Givens, Clay Hodge, Rachel Irvin, Jasmine James, Kailey Ketter, Alexandra Laroche, Sarah Lipshy, Lydia McCollum, Marie Owens, Chelsea Parrish, Victoria Sadler, Rebecca Skipper, Hannah Weeks and Alex Willis are the participating student-curators.
For more information about The University of Alabama’s programs in studio art and art history, go here: https://art.ua.edu/academics/graduate-programs/art-requirements/.
The Paul R. Jones Museum is located at 2308 6th St. in downtown Tuscaloosa. Gallery hours are Monday through Friday 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and the first Friday of every month from noon to 8 p.m.
The Paul R. Jones Collection of American Art is part of UA’s College of Arts and Sciences, the University’s largest division and the largest liberal arts college in the state. Students from the College have won numerous national awards including Rhodes Scholarships, Goldwater Scholarships and memberships on the USA Today Academic All American Team.